


for i have never known love before

by margctbishop



Category: Ratched (TV)
Genre: But mostly fluff, F/F, is it too early for Christmas fics?, mentions of abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-11
Updated: 2020-10-11
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:48:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,626
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26953885
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/margctbishop/pseuds/margctbishop
Summary: Mildred Ratched has never built a snowman. Gwendolyn steps in to remedy this.
Relationships: Gwendolyn Briggs/Mildred Ratched
Comments: 17
Kudos: 108





	for i have never known love before

**Author's Note:**

> "the fire can’t touch me, for i have burned one too many times & the sea can’t harm me, for i’ve been drowning all my life. Oh but you could rip my heart open, darling, for i have never known love before.” - R. / asthreria
> 
> Fair warning: this fic is brought to you by a Southern girl who wouldn't know a pile of snow from a pile of cocaine. I did my best.

She feels as if she’s swallowed the sun, or some lesser known gas planet, as if plasma courses through her veins, so brilliant it could sustain lifeforms. This is not asked of her, though, and she is quite contented with sharing this warmth with Mildred, and Mildred alone. In her dream, their hands are clasped between their bodies, the coarseness of sand particles rubbing where the insides of their palms touch, and the ocean gleams, small waves splashing against their ankles, the bottoms of her pants damp. She doesn’t mind, not when it’s such a nice evening, and certainly not when Mildred keeps smiling in her direction, the apples of her cheeks beginning to pink under the sun. Mildred brings their conjoined hands up to her lips and presses a loose kiss to Gwendolyn’s knuckles, and then she’s gone, bare feet sinking into the wet sand as she darts after a crab scuttling before them, a quickness about her. She follows the crustacean into the shallows before losing sight of it, and she sinks onto her knees in a defeat more graceful than anything Gwen’s ever witnessed, allowing her body to be swayed by the tide. She seems to Gwendolyn an extension of the sea, then, loose limbs opened wide as if to welcome each wave, as if she were trying to gather them up and take them home with her, or else will them to accept her as one of their own.

  
They are alone on this beach, and so when her lover beams up at her, the tips of her auburn hair darkened by salt water, Gwendolyn wades in after her and cradles her face in both her hands. And if only because she can, but more likely because she couldn’t ever not, she places one kiss, and then another, and another, on her upturned lips. She dreams of this in the waking world: holding Mildred as she pleases, kissing her when she wants, not feeling the ugly dredges of paranoia that public spaces always conjure up. Gwendolyn had never thought herself an envious person, but seeing a man take his wife’s hand in public, watching as he brushes his hand against her cheek in a manner which could never be construed as anything but loving, she finds herself envious. If only the world could understand that the love she shares with Mildred isn’t so different from what they consider acceptable, not really, not when it comes down to it. If only they could feel what she feels, then they’d understand.

  
But Gwendolyn Briggs is only one woman, and she cannot instill understanding where there is no want of it. 

  
They are away from prying eyes here, however, in the comfort of their home, and so Gwendolyn makes an attempt to claw her way into consciousness, untangling an arm from where it had twisted in the sheets and reaching across the bed, seeking a hand or maybe a shoulder, something of Mildred’s onto which she can hold. She is met with empty space, and this is sufficient to draw her completely into reality, squinting her eyes as they adjust to the barest hints of sunlight peeking from between the window blinds. It’s early yet, and habit would predict that Mildred still be lying next to her, but she surveys the bedroom and finds it empty. Shrugging off blankets, she slips into her slippers and pads out into the hall.

  
She needn’t go far to find her. Mildred sits before the window in a chair that’s evidently been dragged across the room from the kitchen table. She’s fixated on something that Gwen can’t see, and there’s an expression on her face that the older woman is not quite able to place. Mildred nearly looks wistful.

  
Gwendolyn is careful to not startle her, her footsteps perhaps a bit more forceful than necessary. Still, when she places a hand on Mildred’s shoulder, the woman starts. Mildred turns a sheepish smile toward her, reaching up and intertwining their fingers, and leans her head back to rest upon Gwendolyn’s stomach. 

  
“Did I wake you?” Her voice is barely audible, a ghost of a thing drifting up towards Gwendolyn.

  
“No.” She drops a kiss to the top of Mildred’s head. “Why are you up so early?”

  
“Look,” her lover says, tilting her chin upwards slightly, and Gwendolyn follows the direction and peers out the window. “It’s snowing.”

  
“That it is.” The downfall is light, but there’s a bit already collected on the ground, a few inches, maybe. It’s pretty, but it’s certainly nothing to be in awe over, at least in Gwendolyn’s books. “Do you like the snow?”

  
Gwen doesn’t know. Last winter, they had been in Mexico for her treatments, and it hadn’t snowed there. Now, back in her own home, she watches her lover stare out at the white onslaught outside, and it strikes her how there is still so much more to learn about this woman.

  
“I suppose,” comes her reply, but she voices it almost as a question, like she’s uncertain. A beat passes while Gwendolyn attempts to formulate a follow-up question, but then Mildred speaks again. “I always thought it might be fun to build a snowman.”

  
“You’ve _never_ built a snowman?” she asks, and then winces and regrets having voiced that particular thought aloud. It really shouldn’t be surprising; Mildred was, _is_ , an orphan. Unlike Gwendolyn, she never had parents to bundle her up in multiple layers of warm coats and send her out with the neighbour kids to play in the first snow of the season, or to bring her hot chocolate afterward while she warmed her hands by the fire.

  
But Mildred doesn’t seem to mind the question, merely humming an answer in the negative. A sudden urge swells within the blonde’s chest, an urge to make up for everything that this woman was deprived of as a child, to present to Mildred the love and care she’d never experienced. She wishes suddenly to have known her back then, if only to remedy the wrongs brought about by her circumstances, or to somehow turn back the clock and spare her the orphan’s lot. She knows that her parents would have helped the little girl with no family, if not taken her in to raise alongside Gwendolyn and her sister.

  
But time has shown that wishing is good for very little, for nothing that really matters, anyhow, and Gwendolyn resolves to do what little she can now. She untangles their fingers and makes for their shared closet, rummaging around in a few boxes that still need unpacking before finding what she’d come for. Mildred gives her a curious look when she sees the coats, gloves, and hats in Gwendolyn’s arms, the furrows between her eyes deepening further when a set of each is deposited in her lap.

  
Gwen only smiles. “Bundle up, baby.”

Gwendolyn is considerably less warm than she’d been in her dream, but she doesn’t mind, not really. Not when Mildred, wrapped in about 4 layers of thick fabric and a hat that Trevor had knitted for Gwendolyn a few years back, grins up at her tentatively, reaching out to pull a bit of snow toward her and working to pack it into a neat ball. She’s a perfectionist in everything she does, and when her snowman’s head cracks in her hands after she’d been working to smooth out all the bumps, she huffs.

  
“Here,” Gwendolyn says, crouching down until she’s level with the younger woman. She gathers her own snow, moulding it under Mildred’s watchful gaze, her fingers going numb despite her own gloves. After a bit, she’s satisfied with it, smiling over at Mildred as she looks down at the slightly misshaped ball in Gwen’s hands. “His imperfections give him character.”

  
Mildred nods like she understands and goes back to work on her own clump of snow, her hands less forceful this time around, doing her best to ignore the lumps and focus instead on keeping it together in her palms. She looks to Gwendolyn for what the older woman thinks is approval, and she nods her head, happy to give her the validation she seeks. Mildred nods once in response and goes about forming its middle section. Gwen is helpless against the rising affection that starts in the soles of her feet, rooting her to the spot, and she knows that it must have reached her face when Mildred looks up and seems momentarily taken aback. Gwendolyn recognizes that look; she worries that she’s done something wrong. The blonde shakes her head quickly, manoeuvring carefully around their snow people in the making to drop kisses on the rise of Mildred’s cheeks. 

  
“I’m concentrating, Gwendolyn,” she huffs out in faux annoyance, but Gwen hears the underlying joy in her voice, sees the appreciation on her face. She can’t help but kiss her once more, this time on the lips, before backing away, returning inside in search of buttons for the eyes and carrots for the noses. It takes her a moment to locate the sewing kit, and when she’s returned, Mildred is finishing up the last ball of snow. From the porch, Gwendolyn sees that she’s biting her tongue lightly in her concentration. The snowfall’s abated, and the sun is rising above the roof of the house, the temperature rising. The life expectancy of the snow people is short, and still, Gwendolyn smiles.   
She’d be content playing in the snow with Mildred tomorrow, and the day after, if that’s what her lover wished.

  
“Hey, slowpoke.” She’s brought out of her silent revelry when Mildred’s voice finds her from the yard, and she returns the easy smile thrown her way. The carrots are a bit on the smaller side, but when they’re finished, Mildred says they’re charming. Gwendolyn is inclined to agree. 

They return indoors when the chattering of Mildred’s teeth becomes so fierce that Gwendolyn fears she’ll chip a tooth. Mildred looks a bit forlorn at the prospect of abandoning her and Gwen’s snow people to the sun, but she perks up considerably when Gwendolyn teases that she’ll make up for it. The blonde only feels slightly guilty that Mildred likely thinks she’s alluding to sex. But only slightly, because she’s rather sure the hot chocolate will be a nice consolation. 

  
“Go get out of those clothes,” Gwendolyn instructs, helping Mildred shrug out of the outermost layers of clothing. She doubts she would be able to manage on her own. “I’ll get a fire going.”

  
“I thought we could get out of our clothes together.” Gwendolyn knows that she’s aiming for seductive, but bless her, between her chattering teeth and Rudolph-Red nose, she ends up landing somewhere between adorable and pitiable.

  
“As tempting as that sounds, I think we should be focused on raising your body temperature before you catch hypothermia.”

  
“Well, as you know, Miss Briggs, I am a medical professional,” she replies, taking an end of Gwen’s scarf in each hand and using them to pull her closer. “And I happen to know that sex does, in fact, raise one’s body temperature quite effectively.”

  
_This woman_. Gwendolyn closes her eyes briefly, exhales sharply, and knows from the tell-tale chuckle breathed from Mildred that she thinks she’s won. She hopes the flush on her cheeks will pass for an effect of the cold.

  
“Mildred Ratched.” She brings a hand up to cup one of Mildred’s cheeks, into which her lover instantly nuzzles. “Will you please go change into dry clothes so that I can stop worrying?”

  
That does it, just as she knew it would. With a resigned sigh, Mildred releases her grip on her scarf and makes for the bedroom, and Gwendolyn doesn’t think she’s imagining the added sway to her hips. If she weren’t so eager to follow up with tradition and make the hot chocolate, she would be trailing after that woman like a puppy. Lord knows she has before. 

  
But, Gwen reckons, He must also know that that woman is worthy of being trailed after. 

As it happens, Mildred is very fond of hot chocolate, especially after she’s managed to convince Gwendolyn to top her mug off with whiskey. It breaks from tradition, but Gwen feels that her mother wouldn’t mind. She likes to think she’d even be happy for her.

  
Gwendolyn certainly is. Happy, that is. Who wouldn’t be with Mildred Ratched lying atop them? The emptied mugs are forgotten on the end table, and Mildred’s body is stretched out across hers, her head tucked beneath Gwendolyn’s chin. She’s restless by nature, but now Gwendolyn would take her even breathing for sleep if her fingertips weren’t running circular patterns on her chest. 

  
“Gwendolyn?”

  
“Yes, darling?”

  
“I need to...” The way the end of her sentence drops off, akin to a plane nose-diving off a cliff, would be cause for concern if Gwendolyn weren’t accustomed to it. She’s learned that sometimes Mildred starts up before she’s fully figured out exactly what she wants to say. Or how she wants to say it. “I misled you earlier.” A beat, and then, “I actually have built a snowman before.”

  
“Oh?” It’s all she can think to say. All she really needs to say. She knows how this ends because it always seems to end this way. For Mildred, at least.

  
“I woke up one morning, and it was snowing. I was young. I don’t really remember how old, exactly.” She curls more closely into Gwen, her speech slow. “I was so excited. I didn’t even put on a coat, just ran outside in my nightgown. I’d seen the kids next door building all of these snow people the day before, and I wanted to do that too.”

  
Her voice is distant, the way it sometimes gets when she’s speaking of her childhood. Gwen tightens her arms around her lover’s body, drops a kiss to her hairline.

  
“I was so excited. I don’t even remember how the snowman turned out. Or if I finished him. I only remember that I was excited, and cold. And then he came home before I’d finished.” She pauses here, lets out a shaky breath. Gwendolyn knows that this is hard, but she doesn’t know whether Mildred is telling her because she’s promised to be more honest with Gwen or because she simply wants Gwen to know. 

  
She hopes it’s the latter.

  
“He came home. And then he... he yelled.” She loses her footing on the last bit, clears her throat. “He yelled. Screamed. And then he hit me.” Gwendolyn pulls her closer still. “He beat me. And I never played out in the snow again.”

  
“Oh, darling.” She doesn’t mean it to sound patronizing, or pitying. It’s just that she’s never been very good at keeping the emotions out of her voice.

  
“Thank you for today, Gwen.” It’s sincere, and Gwendolyn _hates_ it. She hates that Mildred feels that what they did today is worthy of thanks. That building a snowman in the yard is a gift rather than a given. But she knows that Mildred doesn’t take anything as a given, and so she murmurs that Mildred is welcome. That, of course, she is welcome. And then she reminds her that she is loved. For good measure.

  
Gwendolyn is warm. She would be more than happy to stay exactly like this, Mildred Ratched in her arms and head the slightest bit fuzzy from good whiskey, until the end of time. For a spell, she allows herself to believe she might be this fortunate.

  
“Gwendolyn?”

  
“Yes, darling?”

  
Mildred cranes her neck and peers up, and Gwen sees the beginnings of a smile on her face. 

  
“Will you take me to bed, now?”

  
As it turns out, that might be even better.

**Author's Note:**

> Any inaccuracies when it comes to that mystical phenomenon that northerners call snow are all mine and very much organic. I’ve never built a snowman, so beg pardon.  
> Drop a comment if you enjoyed? :))


End file.
